Meet Our Faculty

Lindsay Andreas is a teacher because she believes that by empowering students to learn the difference between how to think and what to think is the only way to overcome injustice and inequality.

Ms. Andreas earned dual undergraduate degrees in History and in Education from American University, where she also earned her M.Ed. degree in Secondary School Education. Prior to joining the Grayson faculty, Ms. Andreas worked in the Washington, D.C. public school system, where she taught AP U. S. Government; U. S. Government and Politics; and D.C. History, all of which were writing-intensive courses. She has also worked with the Close Up Foundation, a nonprofit institution whose mission is to help students “exercise the rights and accept the responsibilities of citizens in a democracy.” During her time with Close Up, she was privileged to work with students from nearly all 50 states, and she worked closely with programs supporting the Bureau of Indian Affairs and English Language Learners.

Ms. Andreas' focus is on meeting the high expectations of her students and the social-emotional support that will help them achieve those high expectations in their learning community.

Stacey Angelillo combines 21st-century techniques with fine arts instruction to cultivate creativity in all Grayson students.

Ms. Angelillo holds a B.F.A. in Art Education from Moore College of Art and Design, where she was the winner of the Deborah Deery Memorial Award given annually to the most outstanding student in Art Education. Her work as a teacher reflects her work as an artist, incorporating laser cutters, 3D printers, Makey-Makey, AutoCAD, metalwork, and LEGO in addition to more traditional media such as sculpture, drawing, painting, and photography. She also has substantial experience in teaching art history and differentiating for students with multiple learning styles, including innovative curriculum development for students with a wide range of skills, from absolute beginners through advanced, specialized studio artists.

Ms. Angelillo believes strongly that art education should be interdisciplinary in its approach, and that the process of creating art should encourage students to integrate their identities and experiences so they may express themselves authentically.

Amanda Bates is a multi-talented and dedicated educator experienced in leading students of various grade levels and academic abilities.

Ms. Bates graduated from Arizona State University and is currently finishing her M.Ed. in Educational Leadership from Immaculata University. She has effectively guided classroom activities, tutoring, and evaluating tests and assignments in her prior roles at the Child and Career Development Center, The Goddard School, and Lightbridge Academy.

Ms. Bates is skillful in promoting student engagement through fun teaching methods, individualized attention, and an upbeat attitude.

Majesta Bianco is a strong instructional leader with a significant knowledge of pedagogy and in all elementary content areas.

Ms. Bianco holds a B.A. degree in Psychology from West Chester University and a M.A. degree in Curriculum and Instruction from Rosemont College. She has a strong literacy background and is trained in the Readers and Writers workshop model. Ms. Bianco brings her experiences of residing and teaching students from all over the world, including New Zealand, Ethiopia and China to her classroom.

Ms. Bianco creates a classroom community where everyone feels safe and comfortable and where she teaches her students to think critically about the world around them so that they can grow into compassionate, open-minded, and civically-minded citizens.

Amanda Biscoglio brings experience teaching students from grades K-4 in Pennsylvania and Delaware, with a focus on early literacy to The Grayson School.

Ms. Biscoglio received her B.A. and M.Ed. from Wilmington University in Elementary Education and is a member of Kappa Delta Pi International Honor Society in Education. She has also coached soccer, taught summer camp, and given guitar lessons to students of all ages.

Ms. Biscoglio inspires a love of learning in her students by creating and offering authentic, fun learning experiences which also help them succeed academically.

In addition to teaching Aerospace Engineering, Advanced Mathematics, Physics, and Russian, Michael Brodine also serves as the Musical Director for the award-winning Gryphonix and Gryphonix Jr. choral ensembles.

Mr. Brodine received his B.A. degree from Villanova University and has completed his post-baccalaureate studies in Pre-Med from the University of Pennsylvania. His deep interest across science, mathematics, languages, and the arts is evident across his elective course offerings at Grayson.

Mr. Brodine studied guitar with American jazz musician Chuck Anderson. He plays various musical styles, including country, bluegrass, jazz, classical, and rock ‘n’ roll. In addition to serving as the staff classical guitarist for the Romig, Carney, and Lewis orchestras, he has performed with the bluegrass band, The Keystone Ramblers, and a rock ‘n’ roll band that reached #49 on the Billboard charts. Mr. Brodine writes and performs original music that has been played on national radio.

Mr. Brodine also holds three patents with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in automotive technology.

Traci Brody’s teaching style is extremely creative and full of energy while remaining structured; her lessons are highly engaging and her enthusiasm is both infectious and inspirational to the students in her classroom.

Ms. Brody earned her undergraduate degree in Elementary Education from The Pennsylvania State University at State College. Joining our faculty after 19 years of teaching middle school students throughout the Philadelphia area, Ms. Brody has been on the cutting edge of mathematics and Spanish education, employing technology and hands-on learning long before those were educational buzzwords. Outside the classroom, Ms. Brody is a passionate athlete, and has been since she earned 10 Varsity letters from Lower Merion High School. A supremely loyal fan of Penn State University, she played for both the Penn State women’s lacrosse team and the Penn State women’s soccer team while completing her undergraduate degree.

Ms. Brody has remained connected to girls’ sports since college not only through coaching at the schools at which she has taught, but also by acting as a coach and/or trainer to multiple township and club soccer teams, including over 20 years with the King of Prussia Girls’ Club. Ms. Brody was inducted into the Philadelphia JCC Maccabi Hall of Fame that honors Philadelphia athletes, coaches, volunteers, and JCC professionals for their outstanding service, accomplishments, ability, integrity, sportsmanship, and character.

Peipei Chen was attracted to the values and culture of the learning community at Grayson, and brings not only proficiency of language, but also a passion for engaging her students in the culture of the languages she is teaching.

A native speaker of Mandarin Chinese, Ms. Chen earned a B.A. in Japanese Language and Linguistics with high distinction from Nanjing University and an M.A. in Japanese Language and Linguistics from Beijing Foreign Studies University. While both her degrees are in Japanese, she has taken numerous courses on Modern Chinese as well as other comparative studies on the Chinese and Japanese languages.

Ms. Chen is a member of TAOLI Chinese Language Educators in the Mid-Atlantic, and has taught at the Great Wall Chinese School and the Chinese Benevolent Association Chinese School in the Philadelphia area, as well as university-level Chinese at The College of Wooster and Swarthmore College. She also provides tutoring and instruction to various private clients in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Ms. Chen is also a member of Omotesenke Domonkai Eastern Region USA, an association of practitioners in the ancient art of the Tea Ceremony. She is also certified to teach this traditional ceremony and has achieved her Omotesenke License, Karamono.

Sophia Coates wants her students to feel comfortable seeking help and asking for the resources they need to succeed. She believes it is most important that her students have space and skills to advocate for their needs, regardless of age or grade level.

Ms. Coates received an M.S. in Counseling from Villanova University and a B.A. in Education and Psychology from Dickinson College. In addition to her clinical coursework in family systems counseling, therapeutic strategies with children, and psychopathology, Ms. Coates is both a certified school counselor and a nationally certified counselor (NCC) with more than 700 hours of counseling experience at the elementary, middle, and high school levels in the Philadelphia area. She is trained in Crisis and Trauma Management through the American School Counseling Association and completed the Cognitive Behavioral Intervention for Trauma in Schools (CBITS) training that focuses on small group interventions for students impacted by traumatic events.

Ms. Coates’s final project at Dickinson College focused on school counselors’ multicultural competency, which she further explored in her graduate studies. She feels strongly that multicultural competency is an essential area that requires continual growth and development for all educators.

Annie Connolly-Sporing provides her students with an intentional, personalized, and engaging education that challenges them to stretch their capabilities. She believes it is important for science as a whole to include larger discussions of representation and identity, and wants her students to think critically about science beyond reactions, compounds, and the biological building blocks of life.

Ms. Connolly-Sporing holds a B.S. with Honors in Chemistry from Haverford College, with a concentration in biochemistry, as well as certification from the American Chemical Society. While at Haverford, she was a recipient of a William Hartzell Trust Scholarship, awarded to students showing “unusually high promise of future distinction.” Ms. Connolly-Sporing’s thesis research was titled “Studies toward the CRISPR-Cas9 mediated knockdown of four β-octopamine receptors in the western honey bee (Apis mellifera),” which involved alteration of the four genes related to appetite suppression in honeybees. This research was a pilot experiment of a larger study which would attempt to scale up this work, followed by a series of behavioral assays, with the goal of publication in an academic journal.

The constantly evolving field of computer science has always been a passion for Kelsey Connor-Watts who excitedly shares her interests in technology and computer forensics with her students, building their own coding, problem-solving, adaptability, and teamwork skills.

Ms. Connor Watts earned a B.A. degree in Computer Science from La Salle University.

Kelly DiLullo is highly skilled in student-centered learning, student engagement, collaboration and teamwork. She advises our faculty and supports our students in providing differentiated instruction.

After earning her B.S. in Elementary and Special Education from Rivier College, Ms. DiLullo earned her M.Ed. in Gifted Education from Millersville University. She has taught gifted students for over ten years in public schools, and is a recurring presenter at the district, state, and national level for best practices in gifted education.

Ms. DiLullo has developed gifted curriculum and lesson plans, and is successful in both group and individual instruction. She shares, “As an educator, it is important to me to build relationships with my students. When there is trust, respect and understanding between a teacher and student, learning is limitless.”

Mia DiMeo encourages her students to express themselves boldly, whether verbally or in writing; she hopes to learn from them as much as they can learn from her. 

Ms. DiMeo graduated magna cum laude from Bryn Mawr College, receiving an A.B. in English with a minor in Education. In addition to her English and Writing classes, Ms. DiMeo also serves as a Middle School Advisor.

Her favorite part of her job is reading the interesting arguments and ideas her students express through their writing, as she believes words alone can be a superpower.

As an educator, Catie Doherty brings learning from her own educational experience in creating an environment of mutual respect.

Ms. Doherty graduated from George Washington University summa cum laude with a B.A. degree in Environmental Studies and a minor in Public Health. She is a strong advocate for environmental and health policy and believes that understanding must be accompanied by getting involved. Her professional experience has involved grassroots organizing and training adults, which she applies to her work in the classroom, sharing that “it is vital to listen to people about their experiences to figure out the areas with the most growth potential.”

A professor in college, who worked in the UN on children’s rights, always reinforced that society needs to do better in acknowledging that children’s inner worlds and understandings are just as rich and complex as adults. Ms. Doherty shares, “My philosophy is treating the children’s emotions (good or bad) and thoughts (logical or wildly silly and creative) with respect and dignity.”

Cathy Farrell brings experience in teaching reading, writing, and language arts in the classroom and as a Tutor/Reading Specialist to Grayson. She especially enjoys working with students 1:1

Ms. Farrell earned her M.Ed. degree in Curriculum and Instruction, and is certified as a Reading Specialist from The Pennsylvania State University. She holds a B.S. degree in Elementary Education from Cabrini University. In addition to her own tutoring business, Ms. Farrell has also worked as a case manager for a local homeless shelter for families.

Ashley Freeborn creates a healthy school culture and supports the social and emotional development needs of all Grayson students.

Ms. Freeborn holds a M.Ed. in Education with a focus on Learning, Cognition, and Development from Rutgers University’s Graduate School of Education. She earned her undergraduate degree in Criminal Justice from Temple University and is licensed by WOAR as a Sexual Assault Crisis Counselor. Ms. Freeborn has also earned certification in Youth Mental Health First Aid, Managing Aggressive Behaviors, and Experiential/Adventure Education. Before joining The Grayson School as a teacher, Ms. Freeborn was a life skills counselor for older youth preparing to transition out of substitute care in Philadelphia, helping young adults create goal plans to live independently.

Ms. Freeborn shares, “I find it is most important to trust that children and adolescents know themselves best. I aim to offer compassion, connection, and collaboration while working with students to grow towards their best possible selves as human beings.”

Jason Furda brings a passion for merging mechanical and electronic design, tinkering with computers, and robotics to Grayson. He assists in Computer Science and VEX Robotics classes, and provides on-demand tech support for our students and staff.

Mr. Furda is majoring in Mechanical Engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology.

A student of the world, Gabriel Garfinkle has lived abroad to study in Germany, to teach in Brazil, and to lead a grass-roots development project in India. He speaks five languages, including English, German, Portuguese, Hebrew, Spanish, and has a basic familiarity of Hindi.

Mr. Garfinkle earned a B.A. degree in Political Science and German from Connecticut College, and a M.A. degree in Philosophy from Temple University. He has most recently been an Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at Delaware County Community College, teaching Philosophy and Religion courses. Mr. Garfinkle has added his expertise to curriculum and operations for Philly Outdoor Science Education and Main Line School Night. He has also taught classes at The Pennsylvania State University on logic and ethics, at Youth Empowerment Services (YES-Philly) on critical thinking, and at the Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School in Maryland with students in K-2 on media literacy, interpersonal skills, languages, mathematics, and reading.

Patrick Gray brings experience in working with children and strong organizational skills to proctoring all recess periods and assisting with after school activities.

Mr. Gray has completed undergraduate work in Political Science and earned a B.F.A. in Visual Media Arts from Emerson College. His work in theater production, education, as a test proctor, and receptionist will bring great value across many aspects of our school.